Page 39 of An Inconvenient Vow

“Come on.” She whistled the dogs and walked after Sir Jeffree. The dogs followed along happily, swinging their tails so hard their whole bodies wagged.

Jeffree was just emerging from the stable. “Your horse is being saddled,” he said briefly and reached down to pat Brisis.

“What must we do next?”

“Naught. Osborn will bring down your bags along with mine.”

“What of your parents?” she asked hesitantly. “I mean, your mother and Sir Dudley?”

As though she had conjured them with her words alone, she heard excited voices and the rumbling of wheels as a covered cart was brought about, driven by a burly manservant.

“This is their conveyance now,” Jeffree answered dryly as his two half-brothers came spilling into the yard.

“Lady Sabina!” shouted Crispin, noticing her first. His brother Jasper looked up to echo the sentiment before both boys were distracted by the dogs and came running over.

“Are these your dogs, brother?” Jasper asked eagerly as boys and dogs became enthusiastically acquainted.

“Your sister-in-law’s,” Jeffree answered distractedly.

“Your dogs, Lady Sabina?” Crispin gasped admiringly.

“Why, they’re as fine a pair of hounds as I ever did see!” Jasper exclaimed, crouching down and giving a laugh of delight as Feste licked his face.

“Father keeps no dogs at Longacre,” Crispin said sadly. “Though old Mullins has one in his cottage that lets me and Jasper take it out sometimes.”

“Is this the same old Mullins who lends you his penknife?” Sabina asked, earning a pleased look from her young brothers-in-law and a startled one from Jeffree.

“That’s right,” Jasper answered. “He’s as old as the hills and been at Longacre since Father was a boy.”

“What is his dog like?”

“Lark is old too,” Crispin said cheerfully. “But still good for some sport.”

“He has a dark brown coat that curls,” Jasper volunteered. “And doesn’t like anyone to touch his feet.”

As these confidences were exchanged, two coal-black horses were led into the courtyard.

“Those are our parents’ horses,” boasted Jasper. “Beauties, aren’t they?”

“We still have to ride in the cart with Githa,” Crispin added glumly.

“Even though I can ride as well as any boy twice my age.” Jasper sounded aggrieved.

“I too!” his brother chimed in.

“I daresay that is very tiresome for you,” Sabina murmured, noticing her in-laws had come out into the yard. “But it is a long journey is it not? I expect your mother likes to know you are safe.”

“That’s enough!” Jeffree cut in when both boys took a spirited exception to this view. They lapsed at once into silence, squinting up at him with doubtful expressions. Sabina thought they viewed their older brother as a strict authority figure and supposed that was not unexpected considering the age gap between them.

Lady Maud and Sir Dudley exchanged subdued greetings with them, and Sabina saw at once that the Lady Maud was not a morning person. She looked pained whenever her children spoke too loudly and winced a lot as the boys skipped around while their things were loaded onto their cart.

“Careful boys!” their father admonished as he consulted with a wiry-looking manservant he addressed as Hadley.

Githa, the Vyse’s female servant, turned out to be a stout young woman in her early twenties. When Crispin tried to dodge past her, she reached out and caught him with very little apparent effort, bundling him into the cart. Jasper, deciding discretion was the better part of valor, obligingly swung himself up behind his brother. “That’s it, Master Jasper,” Githa encouraged him placidly. “There’s a good lad.”

Then Osborn arrived and Sabina was distracted, for he bought her own sack of clothing down as well as several neat-looking bundles which Jeffree started at once attaching to his own massive horse.

“Where is your steed, Lady Sabina?” Crispin asked, leaning over the edge of the cart.